Genesis 1:26

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

When we read that God created man in his own image, we learn two things:

• We’re created in His image.
• He made a point of telling us this. It’s something He wants us to know.

God has planted in His creation a wonderful clue about Himself. We can learn about God by looking in the mirror. This can’t mean God has ten fingers and ten toes—it’s something more important—but what?

Of all the possibilities, one stands out—creativity. We are like the creator in that we are creative. It’s the most profound and relentless difference between us and the animals. Our innate creativity is why restaurants give crayons to children.

We can learn a lot by studying our own creativity. For example, consider what happens when we write fiction. When we play the role of creator, we see the other side of the relationship between created things and their creator. While there are differences between our creations and God’s, this analogy is useful.

Because analogies are dangerous, let’s look at the differences first. Obviously, God’s creation is vastly larger and more complex than a novel or a play. Also, there is no communication between us and the characters we create. Also, incarnation is impossible in a work of fiction. You can write yourself into a novel but that’s not incarnation; if “you” in the novel suffers, there’s no real pain. Lastly, your characters cannot get promoted out of the novel into the real world. They can’t get out of their fictional universe.

But the similarities are intriguing. First, a creator doesn’t live in created time and doesn’t need to create things in chronological order. You can write the ending of a novel first. Also, a creator lives in a higher level of reality and has higher purposes.

Imagine Romeo wondering if Shakespeare is on the side of the Montagues or the Capulets.

This is a lot to chew on. We can learn from meditating on these concepts, but they’re dangerous too. We must never stop being humbled by the magnitude of all this. If some analogy gets us thinking we actually understand the things of God, we’ve lost our bearings. An analogy can move us from saying, “I can’t imagine how …” to, “I can imagine how …” but never to, “I know how …”

Never stop seeking God’s guidance. Meditating on tough issues pairs well with prayer.

That can be a very productive quiet time.

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These weekday DEEPs are written by Mike Slay. Saturdays' by Matt Richardson. Subscribe here: https://www.ailbe.org/resources/community

The weekly study guides, which include questions for discussion or meditation, are here: https://www.ailbe.org/resources/itemlist/category/91-deep-studies

Scripture taken from the English Standard Version. © Copyright 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.